FDA Seeks Stricter Rules on Antibacterial Soaps

The FDA is raising safety concerns about antibacterial soaps, which they say are not more effective at preventing illness than plain soap. Tom Burton reports on Lunch Break. Photo: AP.

This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.

... I ... he is racing safety concerns about anti bacterial so welcome to lunch break I'm the talking ... the U S Food and Drug Administration is proposing a rule that would require manufacturers of anti bacterial hand soap ... and body washes to show ... that their products are safe for long term deal EU ... and more effective than soap and water ... in preventing illness and the spread of certain infections WS J recorder Tom Burton ... joins us now from our DC bureau Tom welcome to you ... um ... thank you ve these products are all the rage I I e ... I don't even feel like I mean if I ... not using these products but the FDA is mounting that there's no evidence that the soaps are more effective ... than plain soap and water said the case ... Yeh that's right the of the evidence is that you are clean and then were all cleaned with soap and water ... and the FDA is taken and ... really can unusual position that ... a product it's been on the market for several years may not have any value in dollars and so they are asking the makers of these products ... to prove that they have a valid and have a value beyond just using soap and water ... how does that include these hand sanitizer ... that claim to kill ninety nine percent of germs ... ah ... but are they not vetted or supported by evidence ... well your your new breeze come into issues their hand sanitizer years that have alcohol in them or ethanol ... of those do have value and the FDA is not addressing those that all ... they're talking about ok ... the soaps that are better ... their labels anti bacterial ... often are soft so sometimes it can be Barstow ... um but they're different from the alcohol they sanitize a switch to the evolution of value in what is the FTA proposing ... that they do now in terms of required ... they're not taking these products up the market ... they are asking in effect requiring manufacturers ... of all of these antibacterial soaps and body body washes ... to present data ... to the agency and would need to present this kind of clinical evidence ... um via e in twenty sixteen in order to stay on the market if they want to ... on the the main chemical in these products try clothes and has been around for something like forty years why has it taken so long ... for the FDA to take action in Syria ... it's a good question I mean they're a lot of consumer groups a lot of third party groups ... of peoples and people in Congress Senator Edward Markey of Massachusetts has been a ... big person raising this issue for quite some time ... um sometimes the FDA takes a while because it waits for data to develop ... and and that may very well then what happened here the National toxicology program ... studies issues like this and ... it now has some some data from that program ... I believe it's probably based on that waiting for the scientific evidence to to become ... powerful enough ... all right Tom Burton thank you very much ...